How to Convert a Wine Cooler to a Vegetable Cooler

Written by manuel paucar| 13/05/2017

A wine cooler can be transformed into a vegetable cooler. (vegetable image by dinostock from Fotolia.com)

Wine seems to be the best choice for every meal these days with cooking at the forefront of our minds. With this sudden rush of the gastronomic world into everyday life, more and more utensils and cookware are being made. Along with these utensils come appliances such as wine coolers. It can be pretty expensive to have a cooler just for wines, but you can convert the cooler to store vegetables as well.

Things you need

Wine cooler

Transparent plastic bags with an easy-closing feature

Dry ice

Lower the temperature of the cooler. Wine coolers don't work like refrigerators; they are more humid and have different temperature settings to preserve wine. Vegetables need lower temperatures to stay in perfect condition.

Put the vegetables in plastic bags. The bags must have an easy-closing feature because of humidity issues. In wine coolers, humidity is an important element to preserve the wine's bright conditions. Vegetables, on the other hand, deteriorate with excess humidity.

Place dry ice inside the cooler. The cooler cannot generate a powerful freezing effect, but it can retain the cold more easily. Placing three medium-sized bags of dry ice inside the cooler will do just fine to lower the temperature a bit more.

Change the dark door to a transparent one. Wine coolers tend to have a dark door to prevent light from touching the wine bottles. Direct light changes the flavour of the wines, turning them tasteless, and, in some cases, rough. Vegetables are preserved better when there is some light to brighten them.

Warnings

The temperature of some coolers can be lowered as much as a normal refrigerator, but this doesn't mean you have to lower to the bottom setting. In a scale from 1 to 10, the setting should be 5 because as temperature goes down humidity also increases. Beware of normal plastic bags. They don't offer much security against humidity. Don't place the vegetables inside without any cover. Humidity will do its work and rot them.

Tips and Warnings

The temperature of some coolers can be lowered as much as a normal refrigerator, but this doesn't mean you have to lower to the bottom setting. In a scale from 1 to 10, the setting should be 5 because as temperature goes down humidity also increases.

Beware of normal plastic bags. They don't offer much security against humidity.

Don't place the vegetables inside without any cover. Humidity will do its work and rot them.